Thursday, January 18, 2007

"Immersion Corporation have announced that the Samsung SCH-W559 is the first touchscreen mobile phone to use their VibeTonz technology to provide tactile feedback to the user.

The phone, which uses a large 260,000 colour QVGA LCD touchscreen display to replace the mechanical keypad (sound familiar?), will actually receive tactile cues when they press graphical onscreen controls. The response can be customised to one of five feedback profiles.

The VibeTonz system allows the buttons displayed on screen to feel more like real mechanical ones, and can also improve usability when controls are obscured by fingers, or are hard to see due to glare. It can also be used to make the phone more personal, for example, for a loved one's message to arrive feeling like a beating heart, or for a movie trailer to draw you into the exciting motorcycle chase by letting you feel engine acceleration." (Continued via Tech Digest) [Usability Resources]